IIT Chicago-Kent Professor Sarah Harding will deliver the 2015 Constitution Day lecture on September 17

IIT Chicago-Kent Professor Sarah Harding will deliver the 2015 Constitution Day lecture at the law school at 3:30 p.m. on September 17. Professor Harding will address the topic "Categorical Confusion and the Supreme Court's ‘Takings' Cases: A Discussion of Horne v. Department of Agriculture." Professor Harding will be joined in the discussion by IIT Chicago-Kent Dean Harold J. Krent.

The program will be held in the law school's Abraham Lincoln Marovitz Courtroom, 565 West Adams Street (between Clinton and Jefferson streets) in Chicago. The program is free and open to the public, and reservations are not required.

Professor Harding will discuss the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Horne v. Department of Agriculture. The case involves a federal program established during the 1930s to maintain a stable market of several agricultural products, including raisins, by requiring growers to give a percentage of their crops to the federal government without just compensation. A family of California raisin farmers filed suit against the Department of Agriculture claiming that under the Fifth Amendment's "takings" clause, they should be compensated for their crops. The lower courts ruled against the growers. On June 22, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the Ninth Circuit's ruling.

A member of the IIT Chicago-Kent faculty since 1995, Professor Harding has taught courses in property law, international intellectual property, and torts and comparative law, and developed the curriculum and materials for her comparative constitutional law and cultural heritage law courses. Her research focuses on property-related issues with an emphasis on the social and cultural significance of property. From 2008 to 2014, Professor Harding was associate dean for faculty research and development. She has served as co-director of IIT Chicago-Kent's Institute for Law and the Humanities.

Professor Harding is the recipient of IIT's 2015 John W. Rowe University Excellence in Teaching Award that recognizes faculty who have made notable contributions to their profession and to the university.

Professor Harding completed her undergraduate education at McGill University in Montreal. She earned an LL.B. from Dalhousie Law School in Nova Scotia, a BCL from Oxford University during her studies as a Rhodes Scholar, and an LL.M. from Yale Law School.

Constitution Day was established by joint resolution of Congress in 1952 to commemorate the signing of the U.S. Constitution on September 17, 1787. Four years later, Congress passed a joint resolution requesting that each year the President proclaim the week of September 17 through September 23 as Constitution Week. In 2004, Congress mandated that all institutions receiving federal funds hold educational programming related to the U.S. Constitution.

This program is co-sponsored by the Benjamin Franklin Project at IIT, and the IIT Chicago-Kent student chapters of the American Constitution Society and the Federalist Society.

Founded in 1888, IIT Chicago Kent College of Law is the law school of Illinois Institute of Technology, also known as Illinois Tech, a private, technology focused, research university offering undergraduate and graduate degrees in engineering, science, architecture, business, design, human sciences, applied technology, and law.